Help with F3?

So I found out the hard way that I am nowhere near prepared for racing online in F3. I just kept spinning, or going a bit too wide and ending up on the grass. Now it could just be that the Virginia track isn't for me, but I thought I had the hang of it less than a week before I took part in the 1st June event.

I asked over the chat how to stop losing the back end, and some-one replied 'lower anti-roll bar'. I'm not ashamed to admit I'm a rookie, because I have no idea what to do about that. I know where to go to change the anti-roll bar, but when I changed it, the car just got worse.

So, I'm asking for help. I hope to be at least semi-confident before I take part in another F3 event

I'd say to avoid losing the tail you need to use less right pedal until you get a feel for the limit of grip. Its all well and good to talk about fixing the set up to eliminate certain tendencies but ultimately in your case its clear the tendency you'r trying to handicap is your own novice car control for which there's little to be done barring practice. Going wide is typically the result of too much speed so either you're not braking enough or you're getting on the power too much/too early.

I'd agree however that pushing brake bias forward is a good thing to do. In any car you can easily determine if your BB is safe for you by ensuring the fronts lock up before the rears and this can be easily done by watching the replay externally and very slowly to see if this happens at the end of the front straight. Beyond that just keep practicing, ensure your FFB is at a good level and doesn't clip and just try to get to grips with it.

That said the F3 is not the easiest car for a novice to drive. Perhaps some practice in the Formula Vee would slow things down a bit and help you build up those essential car control skills. The Vee loves to spin out if you abuse it but it happens slower. I've found that the AMS updated F3 has similar capacity to be controlled through the slide as well making the FVee I believe a very good trainer for the Formula 3.

Yeah I agree, brake bias is a huge factor. I use 60/40. In the F3 I even (oddly) found myself using less front wing than rear wing by about 2 ticks.

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it is not odd .. you are shifting grip balance to rear (by removing grip from front) and making car more understeery - easier/safer to drive .. it is less willing to initialy turn in but untill it makes you slower on uncomfortable, nothig odd about it with less aero you can also try to soften front springs a bit to get back some low speed front grip in turns without worying about ride hight on fast straights

If you like to trail brake (ie. keeping a little brake on as you turn in to help turn the car) then pretty well all the default set-ups in AMS have the brake balance way out. If this is the case then move the brake balance forward until the nose pushes wide as you turn in and then back off a little until you get a nice balance.

More than the other sims I think several of the cars in AMS (definitely the rear engined ones) respond well to keeping a little throttle on as you turn in for stability. I don't drive the F3 much but the Vee and the Boxer certainly benefit a lot from this but you need to left foot brake to make it work. If the "coast" setting on the diff is adjustable you can also raise the percentage a bit to make the car turn a bit less on entry.

If you are spinning on the exit of corners then more rear downforce might help in faster corners and as said before reducing the rear ARB or increasing the front can also help as can reducing the diff "power" setting.

More miles in the car should also help you to learn the limits. if you watch real life F3 the drivers go up to the limit but rarely over it as the cars don't allow you to get away with many liberties.

SpeedyMite RacingStaffPremium

Newbie here also but I don't remember having that much trouble… I spent quite a lot of time in the Vee first (in SCE first, where I found the car undrivable to start with… I found it easier in AMS; not sure if I made some progresses or if the car is actually different). When I started with the F3, I had already spend quite a lot of time driving other cars, including a full AMS championship in the Vee. And I picked up the F301 as it is a tad slower so I thought it could be easier.
So with all this: maybe you are trying to jump to fast! Especially if you try to go online: there are some aliens in there! Pretty normal to be at the back, don't be ashamed! Just try to stay on track (that might mean go slower...), and you will make progresses! I see that you are booked for the Marcas race: that would be a nice starter car! (Too bad that the field is dying with this car, it seems people are loosing interest in it; not sure if we will have many other Marcas races now… but that's an another story.)
In any case: don't mess with setups too quickly! Brams has been very clear once: you will not gain any time messing with setups unless you already know pretty well the car and the track. What I would suggest if you want to continue and improve is to make the Driver Academy: you need to be premium for that, I think it is better to have a few hours under your belt but that training is priceless, you'll learn a lot! Just this could justify going premium… And continue making online races: practice, practice,… The more you drive, the better you'll get. People in the club are really willing to help and giving advice. I even got nice people that took me behind them to show me the best line on a new track!
Sorry, pretty long post…

Don't start off with the new F3. That one is a bit ''broken'', i think. I tried it right after it got released a couple of months ago and was baffled by how loose and twitchy it was and how i kept spinning all the time. It was nothing like the lovely, grippy, easy to drive F3 i was used to at all.
I then found out it's got different physics than the old one.
It's also a couple of seconds slower in lap time.

My advice, then - start out in the older F3. I bet you'll find that one much more forgiving. I do.

Premium

I would advise against changing anything drastic in terms of setup, the car is plenty stable enough in its basic setup if driven correctly and gentle. Go back into the garage and load the Default setup and try to drive at least 10 laps in a what you feel like is a decent pace. Then concentrate on the fast corners and try to gain speed and work yourself down to the slow corners.

Are you loosing your back when approaching the corner or when you are leaving it?
In case of scenario one, simply brake earlier and if trail breaking, do most of the slowing down before starting to turn the wheel. In case of oversteer, loosing the back while exiting the corner, you are simply too early too hard on the accelerator. (This could also be managed by the differential settings in the setup, look here: http://www.racedepartment.com/threads/setup-differential.98455/#post-1900352 )

Premium

Some good advise here, my finding with this car in default setup is that it is too loose on corner entry and so it is easy to lose the back when turning into the slow /medium corners and also a bit when on the power.
One of the first things I'll do to the default setup is to greatly increase the differential settings in both coast, power and preload. So for Virginia international for example, leave the pits and drive a steady first lap noticing that when in the slow to medium corners the back wants to come around on throttle lift (lift off oversteer), now try with the settings changed from 10,20,11 to something extreme like 45,60, 20 (don't touch anything else yet).
Notice how the car is now much more stable and drivable (with some understeer for now)?
once you get a feel for this then gradually reduce the settings again to get a nice turn in.
All this is really only applicable in the slow to medium speed corners, for the faster stuff you will want to play with the aero balance (moving the center of pressure either forwards for oversteer or rearwards for understeer), I too find a slight reduction in front wing easier to drive but harder on the front tyres.
Try it out anyway, it should make the car easier to drive to start with, as you progress then more oversteer is recommended as it is generally faster. I'm no expert but I too found this car hard when I started out in it using GSCX.